Sustainable Communities Initiative

Both the ‘Grok and GovernmentOversite went to the same event last week: a “listening” session conducted by NHListens (an offsoot of the Carsey Institute at UNH, where “Carsey” is the uber-Progressive TV producer, Marsey Carsey).  Here is the video that ‘Grok friend Ed over at put together over at GovernmentOversite (a mashup of some of the activity at the meeting with micro-interviews with Tim Carter of the Lakes Region TEA Party included (emphasis mine):

Read this before viewing: There are Nine Regional Planning Commissions within the State of New Hampshire. The Commissions were created by the Legislature and are given the task to create a regional master plan, a housing needs assessment and to assist towns in land use planning. They also derive most of their funding from the Federal Government. A smaller percentage comes from monies that are paid to it in the form of membership dues. The Nashua Regional planning commission applied for a planning grant offered by HUD, Housing and Urban Development, EPA Environmental Protection Agency and the DOT Department of Transportation. The planning grant is under the Federal Sustainable Communities Initiative. The initiatives primary goal is to support international agreements that incorporate “Sustainable Development” into local land use planning.The most commonly accepted formal definition of sustainable development is taken from Our Common Future, the landmark 1987 report of The World Commission on Environment and Development. Chaired by former Norwegian Prime Minister, Dr. Gro Harlem Brundtland and is the base document promoting the agreement known as Agenda 21, an action to be taken by member states of the United Nations to control all aspects where humans have an effect on the environment.

In New Hampshire the Sustainable Communities Initiative has been given the name, The Granite State Future…

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The last of the NHListens session at the Plymouth Senior Center on behalf of the Granite State Future plan, which is the local instance of the Federal Government’s way to Federalize local zoning codes via bribing us with our own money as the HUD / EPA / DOT throws money (with strings attached via the “Sustainable Communities Initiative” program) at the nine Regional Planning Commissions around the State.  Here’s the video:

Circle “AAAA”:

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Pretty much more of the same – Part 10:

• Business startup issues: ease of startup credit, banking issues / regulation (to customers, on themselves), reduce barriers to entry,
• Train the workforce – not to be the cogs in a machine but to design that machine, teach them to be entrepreneurs
• You should be willing to pay more to a local store to have a local economy and support it.

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And we start right in with Part 8:

• continuing on the economy was a lady that asked the question “what is the next thing?” as if an entire State’s economy could be planned to succeed.  An older gentleman answered but I could not hear what he said,but true to form, The Enforcer went right after that.
• One of the gentleman wanted to start a new business in NH but is hesitant due to the costs and regulatory headaches.
• Two warring ideologies in the State: *I* built that vs Warrenism – “You didn’t build that” – is it individual effort or is it a community effort?

Part 9:

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“…who controls the natural resources and are they privately owned or a community resource?“

What have we learned so far as we get ready for Parts 6 and 7 of the NHListens session at the  Meredith Plymouth Senior Center this past Thursday?  Seems like listening isn’t what it used to be, I guess – especially if the circle is stacked.  Again “and remember that number 10!“.  If you start with 10 seats and

• A strictly controlled meeting agenda of questions and issues
• A division of the prospective audience / attendees into “circles” consisting of about 10 people (remember that number)
• Paid “Facilitators” and “Scribes that are to guide the “conversations” and to “take notes” – in this case, paper easels
• The “Enforcer” – tasked with being the person who would argue with anyone that was challenging the narrative.
• The Enabler(s) – those folks that dribble in “talking points” during the discussion usually at the most opportune times to be “slick and smooth”

five of them are seemingly “in” on it, it tends to drown out what seems to be the REAL disenfranchised citizens in all this. Five seats taken in a 10 person?

There certainly were the advocates for the poor and for organizing as John Krebs said in the Intro:

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Well, during the recording of circle “BBBB”, I bet you’ve noticed that, on occasion, I panned over to one of the other groups.  Primary reason?  Well, the Scribe over there was writing a whole bunch more than this group (including when Tim Carter got up, walked to the front of the group to explain to the Scribe that her notes needed updating as she “missed” an important part (i.e., that verbiage said during the conversation that mentioned “NH’s strong believe in private property is a barrier to the aims of the Granite State Future plan” was completely left off the easel).  So, I asked Molly, if I could set up another camera to cover group “AAAA” easel due to its activity – and she agreed.

Why?  An experiment – knowing I was over in one place, I wanted to see if anything would keep this camera from seeing the easel at any time.  And yes, when I got to the end of watching the entire thing, I was not surprised to see how things turned out:

• The Scribe who had been standing to the side during the time before the camera was set up adjusted her behavior to mostly stand in front of it.  Sure, it blocked the camera view but I also thought it rude for that circle’s attendees as there was little opportunity for them to look up and see what was going on.
• Even as Molly agreed to the camera, she blocked it a couple / few times.
• At one point, the camera itself was moved

Flashlights, I guess, are not well loved.  All that said,  I was surprised to see that the same roles I identified over at Circle “BBBB” were replicated in this circle as well.  Now, I thought that it was happening,  as during the event, I could actually hear some of the discussions happening over there even as I was engrossed over here (imagine that even in my middle aged state of being, I can still multi-task (sorta)).  So instead of perhaps having to eat crow, it reinforced what I saw in circle “BBBB”.  Once again I will state – if I had been a participant, I would not have seen the pattern.  Observing it once was enough and twice was confirmation.

Warning – the audio is extremely pour – if a shotgun mic isn’t going to make sense of this noise in the room, a simple FlipCam mic is not going to rise and jump over that bar…and it is an hour and twenty minutes long.  So I listened for you:

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Continuing on from Parts 1, 2, and 3 of the NHListens “visioning” meeting at the Meredith Plymouth Senior Center (NH).  Thus far, the important takeaways that I have observed thus far:

• A strictly controlled meeting agenda of questions and issues
• A division of the prospective audience / attendees into “circles” consisting of about 10 people (remember that number)
• Paid “Facilitators” and “Scribes that are to guide the “conversations” and to “take notes” – in this case, paper easels
• The “Enforcer” – tasked with being the person who would argue with anyone that was challenging the narrative.

and a new one to add:

• The Enabler(s) – those folks that dribble in “talking points” during the discussion usually at the most opportune times to be “slick and smooth”

This seemed to emerge in Part 3 (2 minute mark) when Susan started in on talking about Smart Growth principles, caught herself, and started to label them as if they were traditional New Hamspshire ones (instead of being cooked up by “Planners” that know better then we how and where we should live – certainly NOT a Live Free or Die Sentiment, or a Liberty & Freedom one either).  So, let’s return to my phrase: “and remember that number 10!“.  Next up is Part 4 which starts to show another dynamic right off the bat – those that are perfectly fine with a forced collectivism concerning land use, community priorities, taxes, and services, and those that believe that the voters have things right:

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After talking with Tim Carter of the Lakes Region TEA Party and listening to the Intro remarks by John Krebs and Molly Donovan, it was time to start observing “how” the “what” was going to happen.  As I said in the Intro post, I was not there to participate but to merely observe.  To recap some of what I had observed thus far:

• A strictly controlled meeting agenda of questions and issues
• A division of the prospective audience / attendees into “circles” consisting of about 10 people (remember that number)
• Paid “Facilitators” and “Scribes that are to guide the “conversations” and to “take notes” – in this case, paper easels

The meeting lasted just about two hours so there is a lot of video.  Again, I apologize for the relatively low sound quality (even though I was using a shotgun mic that is supposed to mitigate that – sometimes room acoustics trump technology.  I’ll have a few more observations from observing NOT just the circle that I chose to record (circle “BBBB”), but another one as well (to be explained later).  Now to be sure, NONE of the segment / clips are NOT what I would call riveting and jaw dropping excitement video – in fact, they are rather boring if you are expecting “gotcha” moments.  However, I did see some rather interesting dynamics being played out – not only in how each small group was run (and make no mistake – by the end of the evening, it became VERY clear that these were not just simple listening session) but the dynamics between the two poles of the culture / political worlds too.  First Segment here with two more after the jump – and yes, there will be more posts with more later as well as a single post on the other circle I “observed after the fact”.  Each of these 3 three videos runs about 9 to 10 minutes; here is Part 1:

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